SCIENCE. 



75 



anywhere west of Central New York. The stone imple- 

 ments, and I believe there are none of copper, are ruder 

 and less varied than those first mentioned and are found 

 not only in Western Vermont, but also over the eastern 

 portion of the State and the other New England States. 

 The potter}', occurring chiefly in fragments, is incised and 

 cord-marked and decorated with a great variety of patterns 

 made up of straight lines, circles, &c. This and the stone 

 objects, which seem to be associated with it, appear to be 

 the work of a different and less highly cultivated people 

 than those who made the finer specimens first mentioned, 

 and their makers appear to have lived all over New England 

 and Eastern New York. Thus we have evidence of the 

 former occupation of Western Vermont by a widely spread 

 people, of much skill in the manufacture of stone objects ; 

 a people having commenced with those living in the copper 

 region of Lake Superior, and with those living in Florida or 

 some portion of the South, for the shell beaJs are, some of 

 them, if not all, made from Southern species of mollusks, 

 and also of an ancient, but later occupation by a people of 

 less wide distribution and less development in arts. 



THE INDIAN CENSUS.* 



Colonel Garrick Mallery, U. S. A., now attached to the 

 Bureau of Ethnology at Washington, discussed last Monda)' 

 a subject of national interest. On the nine previous occa- 

 sions when the census of the United States was directed to 

 be taken, the Indians, not taxed, forming a part neither ol 

 the voting population nor of any basis of representation, 

 were simply disregarded. The present law provides for 

 the enumeration and the ascertainment of their statistics. 

 This change in legislation may have arisen from the aband- 

 onment of the doctrine of necessary extinction, the ferce 

 natures theory combated by Colonel Mallery at the Nash- 

 ville meeting of the Association in 1877, and from the prob- 

 ability of the early absorption of many of the Indians into 

 the body of the taxable and voting population, which ren- 

 ders them of future political importance, a factor the effect 

 of which should be estimated. It is also probable that the 

 interest in ethnologic research, noticeable throughout the 

 country, has influenced Congress. General Walker, the 

 able superintendent of the census, has availed hirriself of an 

 agency that never before existed. The Bureau of Ethnology, 

 lately established by act of Congress and now under the di- 

 rection of Major Powell, was entrusted with the whole of 

 the duty in question. Without the preparation already 

 made by the Bureau of Ethnology the work could not be 

 done accurately, and by scientific methods. It might pos- 

 sibly have fallen into the hands of mere office seekers, per- 

 haps of persons interested in the concealment if not per- 

 petration of frauds. The enumeration of the Indians is 

 difficult. Though restrained more or less successfully 

 within specified limits, they are still apt to range over large 

 regions, and to be away, for long periods from the place of 

 their compulsory or voluntary habitation. This is especially 

 the case in Summer, and the day of June hxed for the gen- 

 eral census being inappropriate, the first day of October 

 was selected instead. There are other causes interfering 

 with accuracy. If fraud is attempted it is assisted by an 

 enlarged paper-number of recipients of rations, and the In- 

 dians themselves are tempted to swell their lists, both for 

 rations and annuities. Hostile or troublesome bands, 

 under differing circumstances, seek to exaggerate or con- 

 ceal their military strength. The aboriginal reluctance of 

 each person to give his own name, and of all to speak of 

 deceased relatives and friends is well known. These 

 and many other obstacles require that the duty shall 

 be in charge of persons familiar with the Indian 

 customs, who both know what to look for and how 

 to find it. The forms and schedules of the general 

 census being wholly inapplicable, others have been pre- 

 pared with great care. They are five in number. 1. Popu- 

 lation. Each sheet is confined to one family in one dwell- 

 ing, that unit being of much greater importance in savage 

 and barbaric than in civilized life. The location of the 

 dwelling is given by legal and natural subdivisions, also 

 its description ; if a house, whether of brick, stone, adobe, 

 frame or log ; if pueblo, whether stone or adobe ; if lodge, 



*Read before the A. A. A. S. Boston, 1880. 



whether of cloth, skins, slabs, poles, brush, bark, tule, stone 

 or earth. The head of the family, often a woman, is first 

 designated, and the relationship of each person to that 

 head. For each individual the Indian name is given, with 

 the English translation of that name; also the English, 

 Spanish, French or other name habitually used. This 

 serves not merely for identification, but brings out the 

 names originally designated on the system of the gens or- 

 ganization, and also the title or sobriquet generally be- 

 stowed in after-life from some achievement or circumstance 

 often of sociologic, if not historic, interest. Mixture of 

 blood between several tribes, and between Indians and 

 whites and negroes, is noted, and all matters relating to 

 advance in civilization, such as wearing citizen's dress, 

 amount and kind of personal and real property ownership, 

 in which is recognized cultivation of land and sources of 

 subsistence. 2. The schedule for vital statistics inquires 

 into the causes of deaths during the past year, and the prev- 

 alence of the diseases to which Indians are subject ; among 

 other interesting points obtaining in the Indian tongue a 

 statement from the head of the family, or medicine man, of 

 the cause of death, thus showing the aboriginal theories of 

 diseases. 3, Industries, embraces every appropriate par- 

 ticular under that head, classified for full and mixed bloods, 

 and adopted whites and negroes, all by tribes instead of by 

 families and individuals, as in the " population " schedule, 

 and with details more useful for statistical purposes. 4, 

 Education, is on the same principle. Schedule 5 guides 

 and simplifies research into the wondrous system of rami- 

 fied consanguinities and affinities, on which savage society 

 is founded and depends. The work of the present census 

 of the Indians will be of great practical value. It will cor- 

 rect some popular errors which have obstructed judicious 

 legislation, confused statesmanship and misled philanthropy, 

 and will render frauds difficult of perpetration. The sched- 

 ules also show that advantage has been taken of this op- 

 portunity to lead research into points of deep scientific in- 

 terest. 



EXPERIMENTS ON THE STRENGTH OF YEL- 

 LOW PINE.* 



By Prof. R. H. Thurston. 



The elasticity of yellow pine timber as used in construc- 

 tion is very variable, the modulus varying from one to three 

 millions, the average being about two millions in small 

 sections, and a little above one and a half millions in large 

 timber. 



The highest values are as often given by green as by sea- 

 soned timber, and that, under sixteen square inches section 

 and fifty-four inches length, at least, the magnitude of the 

 modulus of elasticity is independent of the size of the piece. 



The density of the wood does not determine the modulus; 

 since the figure varies sometimes directly and sometimes 

 inversely with the density, even where the wood is as nearly 

 as possible in the same condition as to seasoning. 



A high modulus usually accompanies high tenacity and 

 great transverse strength, but it is not invariably the fact 

 that maximum ultimate strength is accompanied by initial 

 stiffness. 



The pseudo moduli, determined by taking considerable 

 deflections, are usually not greatly different from those de- 

 termined from small deflections and light loads. The val- 

 ues of these moduli often decrease with increase in deflec- 

 tion. 



An inspection of the woods tested plainly indicates, in 

 the opinion of the writer, that the density of the pines is 

 so considerably modified by the amount of pitch con- 

 tained in the sap channels that it cannot be regarded as 

 indicative of the strength of the timber. Where quite 

 free from sap the wood usually exhibits increase of 

 strength and elastic resistance to deflection, with increase 

 of density. 



The strength of timber, otherwise similar, is greatly af- 

 fected by its structure, and the" resistance offered to 

 stresses applied transversely is greatest when the sections 



*Read before the A. A. A. S., Boston, 1880. 



